Tuesday, June 9, 2009

With the 26th Selection in the 2009 amatuer draft the Milwaukee Brewers elected to draft a pitcher, and for the first time since 1999 a college pitcher.

Eric Arnett(Right) was the Co-pitcher of the year in the Big Ten this season as well as first team All-Big Ten. He was also a semi-finalist for the Golden Spikes Award.

The big righty (6-5, 225) went 12-2 with an ERA of 2.50, he also pitched six complete games with a .212 average against.

Since Arnett is a college pitcher the hope would be that he could skip rookie ball and jump right into Low-A or High-A. Realistically he will head to Rookie Ball for a few weeks though.

Milwaukee's next pick came at number 39, a compensation pick. The Brewers selected Outfielder Kentrail Davis from the University of Tennessee. Davis had a terrific freshman year in 2008, hitting .330 with 23 extra-base hits, 13 of which were long balls. He was also the only freshman semi-finalist for the Golden Spikes award.

His sophomore year was not as good, he hit just .309 with 9 home runs but did have 25 extra base hits. He is a Scott Boras client so signing might be an issue, but Outfield is not a position of depth in the Brewers system.Their second compensation pick was another big right-handed pitcher, Kyle Heckathorn, 6-6, 225, from Kennesaw State. Heckathorn has a power arm, he throws mid to upper 90's and has a tough breaking ball.

This season Heckathorn struck out 98 batters in 86.1 Innings. His ERA for his junior season was 3.44 and he won four games against just one loss. Another college pitcher, but small college so expect to see him at rookie ball.

Milwaukee also had a pair of second round picks, one of which was from the Yankees for signing free agent pitcher C.C. Sabathia. The Crew selected a high school hitter with that pick, left-handed hitting Maxwell Walla. Walla projects as a corner outfielder and more hitter than anything else.

Here is a complete list of Milwaukee's picks from the first day of the draft: